


Tiqueuse

by ScatteredWords



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Disabled Character, F/F, Gen, Tourette's Syndrome, but that's just me. some people have it much worse, i guess?, more than a disability per se, there's no tag for "inconvenient neurological disorder AU", which is what I consider it to be since I have TS at about this level
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-07-02
Packaged: 2019-06-01 09:10:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15139844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ScatteredWords/pseuds/ScatteredWords
Summary: Carmilla never stops moving, not really. (Tourette Syndrome AU, primarily based on s1)





	Tiqueuse

**Author's Note:**

> This is pure self-indulgence, driven by the fact that I’ve never seen a Tourette Syndrome AU in any fandom, and I wrote it ages ago after the end of s1. So just bear with me.

Laura just marks it down as one more annoyance, at first.

Stealing her pillow, eating her food, clogging the shower drain, bringing back “study buddies” at all hours- and Carmilla never stops  _moving_.

Little things, mostly. Irregular, jerky movements of her fingers when Laura confronts her about not using the chore wheel. Shoulders tensing and relaxing three times in rapid succession as she drops textbooks on her desk and falls onto her bed, opening the dog-eared copy of The Castle of Otranto left there last night. Eye rolls Laura thinks are misplaced even for her, accompanied by strangely fluttering eyelids.

It’s all so at odds with her usual grace that Laura thinks nothing of mentioning it in a video.

“But we’re not here to talk about my horrible, twitchy roommate.”

On her bed, Carmilla stiffens. Laura only notices when she’s editing, hours later.

 

—————————————

 

“By the way, buttercup, sorry my neurological condition bothers you.”

Laura blinks, fingers going still on the keyboard. “What?”

“Tourette Syndrome,” Carmilla replies. “Causes involuntary movements and sounds. Look it up if you want to know the science.”

“Wait, isn’t that the swearing disease?” The instant the words are out, Laura knows she’s said something wrong. Carmilla glares at her, snapping the latest book shut.

“No. I’m surprised little Miss Let’s-All-Get-Along doesn’t know that.” Her tone is poisonously sweet. “What, you weren’t president of the Diversity and Tolerance Club in high school?”

Tense shoulders. Rapid, ragged breaths. Things she noticed suddenly come together with things she didn’t to form a clear picture. Carmilla’s eyes, though, are daring her to mention it.

Laura finds her voice at last. “Fine. I’m sorry I said that in the video. I didn’t know.”

“Good,” Carmilla shoots back. And that seems to be the end of the conversation.

 

——————————————

 

“So…if you’re a vampire, what about…um…”

Carmilla raises an eyebrow. Even tied to a chair and facing god-knows-how-long without sustenance, she still manages to exude dangerous levels of snark.

“Don’t believe everything those asnine shows tell you, cupcake. Being turned just added some new toys to my brain. Didn’t fix what was already wrong with it.”

Over the next nine days, her control worsens. But even when she grimaces, neck muscles cording out, and her irregular breath sends her into coughing fits, Laura doesn’t say anything. That, she thinks, would be adding insult to injury.

And tries not to remember what she read online about stress exacerbating tics.

 

———————————————

 

There are moments- sometimes hours -of stillness.

Laura notices it when Carmilla is deep in a book, or practicing her bass (unplugged, to keep Perry from having a fit). Perfect focus- or relaxation? She finally decides it’s a combination of the two.

Maybe that’s the real Carmilla, and Laura thinks of it that way for weeks. But when she voices the thought to Carmilla as they pore over a heavy Sumerian tome, the response catches her off-guard.

“It’s all real.”

 

——————————-

 

“My parents thought I was possessed for the longest time.”

“Seriously?”

“1680s, creampuff. Science was new and terrifying back then. And it was much worse in my childhood. More vocal tics and worse physical ones.”

“What happened?”

“I learned to hold it in all day, which was an utter catastrophe. Let’s just say that four successive maids gave notice when asked to help prepare me for bed.”

 

——————————

 

Bang.

Bang.

Bangbang.

The rap of Carmilla’s knuckle against the desk is starting to remind Laura of a gunshot. Frequent, but at irregular intervals and always followed by muttering.

Increasingly frustrated muttering.

“Um.”

More muttering, but now muffled by something in the speaker’s mouth.

“Are you okay over there?”

After a moment, “My knuckle is the color of a ripe tomato, so you tell me, cupcake. Think I’m okay?”

Laura stands, stretches, crosses the room. “You don’t have to jump down my throat.”

“Sorry,” Carmilla says without much sincerity. The Sartre open on her desk has been abandoned in favor of nursing her right hand. Laura cringes. The knuckle of the smallest finger is indeed bright red.

“Here.” Without even thinking about it, she takes Carmilla’s hand and starts massaging the injured joint. Carmilla rolls her eyes.

“That’s an exercise in futility. It’ll just start up again when you let go,” she says, once a particularly long breathing tic abates and she can get the words out.

“Then I’ll never let go.” Laura raises Carmilla’s hand to her lips and kisses her knuckle. And in that moment, everything is still.


End file.
